Pet Heir

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Some rich people give their fortune to their relatives, often On One Condition, and some leave their fortune to charity. Then there are the eccentric types who leave their money to their beloved dog, cat, fancy rat, or whatever other critter it might be that they treated like a pet.

That's the concept behind the Pet Heir plot. Hilarity Ensues as the new caretakers of the pet struggle to keep the pet alive despite the efforts of unscrupulous sorts, that is, Inadequate Inheritors who are next in line to inherit should "anything unfortunate" happen to the pet in question.

There are cases of Truth in Television for this trope, oddly enough. Or not so oddly, if the pet in question is long-lived, like a parrot.

Comparable to Caligula's Horse, where the person not only gives their inheritance to their pets, they even give them senior positions in jobs.

Examples:

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Board Games

The board game 13 Dead End Drive is about heirs in line to inherit the late Aunt Agatha's fortune trying to bump each other off in a booby trap-filled mansion, and escape while they're the current heir. One of the playable characters is, you guessed it, the old lady's cat. In the revised version, getting the cat out of the house will give you a game-winning advantage.

Comedy

David Cross had a hilarious bit once about rich people who die and leave their vast fortunes to their cats.

"And all my money goes to Miss Cinderella, so she can live in luxury, like the princess she is. Also, fuck the homeless."

Comic Books

The Lucky Luke comic The Inheritance of Rantanplan has the guard dog Rantanplan inherit a fortune from a former convict, and becomes a target for the Dalton Brothers since Joe Dalton is next in line.

Comic Strips

Garfield: In the November 1, 2001 strip, Jon remarks on how some people treat their pets like children. Garfield's response of "So... Dad. Do you have a will?" implies that he expects to be this.

Pooch Café: Poncho's brother Orlando is this, having inherited a vast fortune from his deceased owner, an oil baron.

What's New? with Phil and Dixie: Parodied in one strip where 3000-year-old wizard Urza dies and leaves his vast fortune and holdings to his cats. There is some litigation expected from his thousands of children, but the fact that "Urza's Cats" are ten-meter-tall cybernetic killing machines might complicate things.

Eastern Animation

There is one Soviet Russian propaganda movie (based on a poem by Sergey Mikhalkov) where a rich American lady dies in a car crash, and her dog inherits her entire fortune. Then the dog goes on to become a socialite, a congressman and then even the President. All because of the money.

Films — Animation

In The Aristocats, the title felines are to be the main beneficiaries of their owner's will in order to keep them looked after. Edgar, the butler, eavesdrops on the conversation and then decides to try to off the cats in question as he was to receive the rest when the cats died. Incidentally, it did "address" the issue of him just waiting for the cats to die: he assumes that each cat really has nine lives. And that the four cats will live consecutively. (He's not very bright.) And yet, she implies at the end that she meant to leave the butler a sizable sum himself.

In The Fearless Four, Aunt Wanda combines this with On One Condition: her estate goes to her family, but only if they take care of her cat Gwendolyn, who inherited Aunt Wanda's "treasure", a pair of incredibly valuable jewels. The family decides to kill Gwendolyn when they get tired of caring for her and frustrated that she won't tell them where the jewels are.

In Millionaire Dogs, a woman left her fortune to her several animals while her nephew and her niece got nothing. The evil duo then tricked the animals out of the house and tried to keep them out for 48 hours in a row so they could invoke an obscure law to claim the inheritance to themselves.

In the film Gordy, an old man disinherits his daughter in favor of a talking pig because of her decision to become a model. This happens just after the pig and his human friend have wrecked her career by innocently causing her trap for them to backfire.

Quite a few live-action Disney films, especially from between the original Disney and Michael Eisner, do this.

The 1951 film You Never Can Tell started with a dog inheriting a fortune and immediately being killed and his caretaker suspected. The dog's spirit is sent back to earth as a "humanimal", detective Rex Shepherd (Dick Powell), to, errr sniff out the crime.

The Richest Cat in the World: Oscar Kohlmeyer left five million dollars to his cat Leo. Oscar's nephew would receive twenty-five thousand dollars if he didn't contest the will. Of course, Leo is a particularly special kind of cat. He can talk for one thing, and is also as smart as a human. In fact, it is his advice that got Oscar his millions in the first place. However, the only people who knows about this are (were?) Oscar, and later on some kids that Leo befriends.

In The Uncanny, Miss Malkin cuts her spendthrift nephew out of her will and leaves her entire fortune to her cats.

In Soul Music, one of Susan's first "customers" as acting Death is a grumpy old man who leaves his fortune to his cat instead of his ungrateful, parasitic relatives. Of course, he hates the cat too, so he doesn't set it up any kind of protection from said relatives.

This forms a major part of the plot in Making Money. At the beginning of the book, Topsy Lavish owns 50% of the shares in the Ankh-Morpork Royal Bank, and her dog Mr. Fusspot owns exactly one share, the result of an eccentric bequest from her late husband. Mrs. Lavish then dies (she was quite old), bequeaths all her shares to Mr. Fusspot... and leaves the dog to Moist von Lipwig, with a note that Moist will be targeted by the Assassins' Guild if Moist should decline to take care of the dog. It turns out, though, that Mrs. Lavish was quite a canny operator using "eccentricity" as a cover to get what she wanted. If she'd left the shares directly to Moist, the will would have been challenged by her money-hungry relatives, and Moist can't be chairman of the bank because he already runs the Mint (which would be a conflict of interest), but there's long legal precedent for rich old ladies leaving money to beloved pets. Her provisional contract with the Assassins' Guild even provides Moist with protection against the money-hungry relatives, as they won't accept competing contracts on the same target, and they won't accept one on Mr. Fusspot.

The adult novel The Mystery of the Fat Cat by Frank Bonham features a variant of this trope. A wealthy old lady left her estate and house to her cat for the rest of its natural life, under the care of a trustee; after the cat's death the house is to go to the city for a park. The book opens with the protagonists becoming suspicious of how long the cat has lived under the guardian's care, and they start to investigate.

In H. Allen Smith's 1946 novel Rhubarb (filmed in 1951), a cranky millionaire leaves everything—including a major league baseball team—to his cat Rhubarb. The team's players and the millionaire's disinherited daughter are among those who have problems with this.

One of the endings for the interactive book "The Dandee Diamond Mystery" has the benefactor's parrot inheriting the diamond.

To Catch a Leaf, by Kate Collins, has a tabby that inherits its owner's mansion and all the contents thereof, including millions of dollars worth of art and furniture.

In Francis M. Nevins' "Dogsbody" a rash of pet poisonings is the work of a disgruntled nephew who feels he's more deserving of his uncle's fortune than the formerly-stray dog which the deceased preferred to his relatives.

Live-Action TV

In an episode of Black Books, Bernard's landlady died and left the building to her cat. Which led Bernard to try and hire someone to off the cat.

On Rescue Me, Tommy's father marries a rich woman and hopes to inherit her fortune when she suddenly dies. After an extensive spending spree, the family finds out that he inherited $50,000, and the rest was left to her various cats.

In Kickin' It, Bobby Wasabi was once told something he didn't believe and his answer was saying it was rich like his dog will be once he dies.

In the Alfred Hitchcock Presents episode "Craig's Will", old Mr Craig leaves his fortune to his dog instead of his nephew. The nephew is satisfied to wait until the dog dies and the fortune passes to him, but his girlfriend, who'd been looking forward to a share, decides to take matters into her own hands.

An episode of Elementary involved a murdered senior woman who left her a $12 million inheritance to her Shih Tzu instead of her children.

An episode of Designing Women had an old woman with a houseful of junk who left her fortune to her cat. Subverted in that the junk turned out to all be valuable collectibles, and she'd made her money in the first place from her cat appearing in television commercials.

Print Media

Dave Barry joked about this in a column, when he writes that cats secretly plot how to be made heirs to their owners' millions and then bump them off.

In "Lisa's First Word", Marge and Homer are looking for a new house, and one of the houses they look at is full of cats, who apparently inherited the place from its late owner. In fact, the Realtor even goes so far as to say that not only do the cats own the house, Marge and Homer would be their tenants.

Another episode of The Simpsons has Mr. Burns naming his pet tortoise as a beneficiary of his will.

Garfield and Friends: Garfield once inherits the Klopman Diamond, but the bad luck curse surrounding it led Garfield into selling it. The money the buyer gave for it went into the repairs of Garfield's home, needed because of the curse.

One Mighty Mouse cartoon features a wealthy couple who left their fortune to their mice. The couple's nephew tries to have their will invalidated but the judge rules that they were in perfect mental condition (albeit one can doubt that while taking a look at the will). The nephew doesn't take it well and ends up being arrested. He soon escapes and decided to steal his uncle and aunt's mansion by dragging it with his bicycle. Fortunately Mighty Mouse restores it to its rightful place.

Precious Pupp once believes he'd inherit a fortune and a dog named Mauler would get everything if something happened to Precious. After Mauler tries (and fails) to kill Precious several times, Precious' mistress gets her new glasses and finds out she misread the will. Mauler is the main inheritor and Precious is the secondary one. Precious' Muttley-like laughter is a sign of upcoming payback.

Sylvester is left a fortune in the short Heir Conditioned. To his dismay, Elmer Fudd becomes his financial adviser and wants him to invest the fortune while Sylvester wants to spend it.

In Dough Ray Me Ow, a pet parrot named Louie learns he's second in line to inherit his master's wealth, behind Heathcliff, a big doofus of a cat who obliviously survives several attempts on his life by Louie.

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